Ex-Honduran President Extradited to United States to Face Drug Charges & More News Here

The former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández was extradited to the United States on Thursday, the place he’ll face prices in a New York courtroom accusing him of trafficking medication for many years to additional his political profession.

About 1:20 p.m., a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration aircraft arrived on the Toncontín International Airport within the capital, Tegucigalpa, and virtually an hour later, the Honduran minister of protection stated Mr. Hernández had been handed over.

A federal indictment unsealed late Thursday in Manhattan charged that over practically the final 20 years, Mr. Hernández “participated in a corrupt and violent drug-trafficking conspiracy to facilitate the importation of tons of cocaine into the United States.”

The indictment charged that Mr. Hernández acquired thousands and thousands of {dollars} from quite a few drug trafficking organizations in Honduras, Mexico and elsewhere, together with from the previous chief of the Sinaloa Cartel, the Mexican drug lord referred to as El Chapo.

Mr. Hernández used the proceeds of his drug trafficking to “enrich himself, finance his political campaigns and commit voter fraud,” together with in reference to the 2013 and 2017 Honduran presidential elections, the indictment stated.

“This case should send a clear message to any foreign leader who corruptly abuses their power to support drug cartels,” Anne Milgram, administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration, stated at a information convention Thursday night.

“If you think you can hide behind the power of your position, you are wrong,” she added.

Attorney General Merrick B. Garland stated Mr. Hernández ran Honduras as a “narco-state.”

Mr. Hernández stepped down in January after finishing the 2 presidential phrases allowed by legislation. Soon after, he was detained at his dwelling in Tegucigalpa, triggering an unsuccessful bid by his legal professionals to block the U.S. authorities’s extradition request.

On the night of Feb. 14, simply minutes after the Honduran Foreign Ministry stated it had acquired the extradition request, police autos surrounded Mr. Hernández’s dwelling, and he was led out the following morning in shackles and sporting a bulletproof vest.

“I’m ready to present myself voluntarily and defend myself in accordance with the law,” he stated in a submit on Facebook that morning. Mr. Hernández has lengthy vigorously denied that he has had any function in drug trafficking.

Last month, a Honduran decide dominated that Mr. Hernández must be extradited to the United States, and his attraction to the nation’s Supreme Court was unsuccessful.

On Thursday, about 100 law enforcement officials escorted Mr. Hernández from the constructing to the helicopter that might take him to a army base subsequent to the Toncontín airport. He wore a cap, a blue vest and masks and a pair of handcuffs.

As the helicopter took flight, loud gunpowder detonations have been heard all through town, with 1000’s of individuals celebrating the long-awaited extradition of the previous president.

“Justice was done,” stated Wendy Sierra, 22, a biology pupil on the National Autonomous University of Honduras. “He left us poor here, he stole everything and favored drug traffickers, and no one ever touched him. But with the gringos you cannot play.”

Allegations have loomed over Mr. Hernández for years because the U.S. legal professional’s workplace in Manhattan and the D.E.A. performed a far-reaching narcotics trafficking investigation that uncovered corruption on the highest ranges in Honduras. The nation of 10 million has change into a gateway for large quantities of cocaine moved via Mexico and into the United States.

In two latest federal trials in Manhattan, testimony positioned Mr. Hernández on the heart of a drug trafficking operation that relied on members of the Honduran army and nationwide police, despatched tons of cocaine into the United States and generated thousands and thousands of {dollars} in proceeds that have been used on behalf of Mr. Hernández’s National Party in campaigns.

Mr. Hernández, alongside along with his brother, Tony Hernández, a former Honduran congressman, “played a leadership role in a violent, state-sponsored drug trafficking conspiracy,” prosecutors stated in a 2021 courtroom submitting.

The new indictment prices Juan Orlando Hernández with cocaine importation conspiracy, possession of machine weapons and damaging units and conspiracy to possess them.

In 2019, Tony Hernández was convicted of conspiring to import cocaine into the United States and different prices and was sentenced to life imprisonment.

Last yr, within the trial of a Honduran man who was convicted of conspiracy and weapons prices, an accountant testified that he heard Mr. Hernández, when he was a presidential candidate in 2013, say he would remove his nation’s extradition treaty with the United States, rendering his associates “untouchable.”

According to the testimony, Mr. Hernández additionally stated, “We are going to stuff drugs up the gringos’ noses, and they’re never even going to know it.”

At the information convention Thursday, Damian Williams, the U.S. legal professional in Manhattan, stated that whereas Mr. Hernández and his co-conspirators helped to push 500 tons of cocaine into the United States — “poison that landed in this country on our streets,” as he put it — there additionally have been staggering prices for the individuals of Honduras.

“Honduras became one of the most violent countries in the world during the defendant’s presidency,” Mr. Williams stated, “and while Hernández amassed money and political influence, the people of Honduras endured conditions of poverty and violence.”

During the administration of former President Donald J. Trump, even whereas Mr. Hernández was below investigation, he was handled as an ally on problems with immigration and safety. In September 2019, after he agreed to a deal that might permit the United States to pressure some migrants to search asylum in Honduras, Mr. Hernández earned a handshake from Mr. Trump through the United Nations General Assembly.

Kevin Okay. McAleenan, then the performing U.S. secretary of homeland safety, stated in a tweet on the time that Mr. Hernández was a “strong partner” who was working to “combat irregular migration and transnational criminal organizations.”

Although it’s uncommon for one more nation’s former head of state to be extradited to the United States to face prosecution, it’s not unprecedented. In 2013, Alfonso Portillo, the president of Guatemala from 2000 to 2004, was despatched to face prosecution in Manhattan, the place he pleaded responsible in a cash laundering case and was sentenced to practically six years in jail.

And Mr. Hernández just isn’t the primary former Honduran president to be prosecuted in New York.

Rafael Callejas, who served from 1990 to 1994, surrendered to the U.S. authorities in 2015 shortly after being charged in a sweeping corruption case that concerned FIFA, soccer’s worldwide governing physique. Mr. Callejas pleaded responsible in federal courtroom in Brooklyn to wire fraud conspiracy and racketeering conspiracy prices; he died in 2020 earlier than he could possibly be sentenced.

Benjamin Weiser reported from New York, and Joan Suazo from Tegucigalpa, Honduras. Katie Benner contributed reporting from Washington.